Listowel Connection

This blog is a personal take on Listowel, Co. Kerry. I am writing for anyone anywhere with a Listowel connection but especially for sons and daughters of Listowel who find themselves far from home. Contact me at listowelconnection@gmail.com

Tag: Sean Carlson

Hands across the Ocean

By

On March 13, 2025

In History, Listowel

Market Street in March 2025

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A few More Old Postcards from Máire MacMahon

William Street looks so busy on that day with ladders, horses, Model Ts and people all over the place.

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An Irish American Poet with a strong Listowel Connection

Sean Carlson no linger lives in Listowel but he maintains a strong link with us.

Sean has been in touch. Here is his news…

Hi Mary,

Three new recent write-ups for you to know about:

“Home and/or Home,” my interview following our 2024 Listowel Writers’ Week panel with Erin Fornoff and Gustav Parker Hibbett on their respective poetry and experiences also growing up in the U.S. and writing in Ireland, was published in The Common, a U.S. literary journal.

“Bus to Ballybunion,” my short dispatch from the Tralee to Ballybunion afternoon route was featured in the winter/spring 2025 issue of Trasna, a journal on Ireland and its diasporas.

“Every time a fly went by,” written in and about Listowel and first published last year in the Honest Ulsterman, was recently selected for Verse Daily‘s poem-a-day anthology.

Best wishes from here!

– Sean

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St Patrick got his very own Executive Order

Here is an exchange from the Oval Office as reported by The National Desk.

(On March 7 2025)

“Lindsey Halligan then presented Trump with the Irish American Heritage Month proclamation. She told Trump it was a “proclamation proclaiming March 2025 as Irish American Heritage month in honor of, to commemorate our amazing friendship between America and Ireland and to just honor all of the Irish Americans and I’m a little bit biased, because I am American and Irish.”

Trump said, “They’re great people, great people.”

Halligan reminded the president, “St. Patrick’s Day is coming up as well.”

Trump noted that Irish Americans voted for him in “heavy numbers.”

Holding up the signed document, Trump told reporters, “So for the Irish American people, proclamation.”

Irish Americans have played a crucial role in our great American story — courageously overcoming adversity and hardship to embolden our culture, enliven our spirit, and fortify our way of life. This Irish-American Heritage Month, we commemorate the special bond of friendship between the United States and Ireland — and we honor the extraordinary contributions of Irish-American citizens past and present, Trump wrote.”

Trump obviously loves our American cousins and they love him as shown by their voting for him in “heavy numbers’. Let’s hope he remembers that when it comes to slapping his beloved tariffs on Big Pharma and Tech companies with their European bases in Ireland.

“If You’re Irish, come into the parlour….”

What a welcome from Donald Trump and JD Vance yesterday?

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Remember

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Deborah’s Lixnaw ancestors

Deborah Cronin wrote

“…I am also related to Tony McCarthy from Lixnaw. His charming wife gave me information to help me. 

I will send you a photo of a map from 1850 that Nora McCarthy sent me. This depicts the McCarthy & McAuliffe properties. We visited the McCarthys a few years. My children have also visited. When we were there we met some relatives, Delia McAuliffe O’Sullivan and Mickey Heapy.”

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A Fact

Our national colour used to be blue. It’s only been changed to green in popular, but not official, culture in the last 100 years.

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Micheál ÓMuircheartaigh Remembered

By

On July 1, 2024

In Listowel

Lavender in a flower bed outside the library

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Official Opening

The service users were the VIPs who officially opened the new Dóchas, St. John of God day centre at Upper William Street on Thursday last, June 27 2024.

“The new Dóchas Day Service is expected to play a crucial role in the lives of many, offering various programs and activities tailored to meet the needs of individuals with disabilities. The service’s goal is to empower these individuals, fostering a sense of belonging and enhancing their quality of life through personalized support and community involvement.”

(St. John Of Gods Kerry Services website)

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Mourning Mícheál ÓMuircheartaigh

(Text and photos from Dan Paddy Andy Festival on Facebook)

Apologies that the photos are not in correct order here.

The sad news reached us on Tuesday of the passing of the legend Mícheál Ó Muircheartaigh. Mícheál became well known to us in Lyreacrompane, not just because of his riveting and unique style of commentating on football and hurling matches on radio and TV but because he graciously agreed to unveil the Dan Paddy Andy Memorial in 1998 and ten years later returned at our invitation to officially launch the Dan Paddy Andy Festival. We have great memories of those times as were recalled by Joe Harrington in an interview with Jerry O’Sullivan on Radio Kerry on Wednesday morning. To hear the interview, (which was by phone) click on the following link. The interview is right at the start and follows a recording of Micheál reciting a locally composed verse at the unveiling in 1998. The total length of the recording and interview is just over 7 minutes long.

We have also added some photos from the events all those years ago… Photo 1 includes Fr O’Connell PP, Dan Paddy’s daughter Mary and her son at the unveiling along with her brother Jimmy from New York and John B Keane with Mícheál Ó Muircheartaigh addressing the crowd. Photo 2 shows two men who knew most about matches! Photo 4 is at the marker outside the house in which Dan was born, lived and died and which is owned by Michael and Sue Lynch who are in the photograph along with Committee members back then. Photo 5 is of Jimmy O’Sullivan and Mícheál Ó Muircheartaigh at the Memorial.  In photo 6 Michael Mangan is making a presentation to Micheál who had returned ten years after he unveiled the Monument to officially opened the 2007 Dan Paddy Andy Festival.

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Árd Chúran Choir

Brenda O’Halloran invited me to hear this lovely choir on their first public performance on June 27 2024. They sang in the lovely Ard Chúram Centre. The audience was made up of visitors from the nearby Aras Mhuire Nursing Home.

It was a special day. I was delighted to be there.

Shelby conducting the choir

Brenda and Shelby

Teresa and Mary

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Irish Christian Names

Sean Carlson’s essay continued

All my life, people have mispronounced and misspelled my mother’s name, Nuala, with no evidence of mal-intent. Mostly, I’ve seen it written as it sounds, “Noola” or “Newla,” and heard it spoken as it looks, “New-ah-la.” She has been referred to as “Nyala,” like the antelope and “Nala” like the “Lion King” heroine. Her most recent Starbucks order was made for “Lula,” and a piece of mail once addressed her as “Koala.” Although Irish names may at first appear daunting, their linguistic logic is easy to understand — with a few pointers.

The dictionary’s blunder — amusing to some, aggravating to others — did have some underlying value: All it takes is a closer look at the perceived disconnects between spelling and pronunciation in modern American English to appreciate the rich tapestry of influences behind the many words in our language that come from others.

The word “alcohol” stems from the Arabic al-kuḥl. “Ketchup” likely comes from the Hokkien Chinese word kê-chiap or the Malay kecap, in reference to sweet sauces. A friend in Ireland reminded me that cappuccino comes from the Italians, which means that whenever we order two, we should, grammatically speaking, be asking for cappuccini.

During summer barbecues, we have German to thank for frankfurters, hamburgers, and sauerkraut. The French gave us camaraderie. Our khaki pants are the result of British colonialism, the word for such a dusty color originating from Hindi, by way of Urdu, by way of Persian. As for the value of having good judgment, the word “acumen,” like so many English words, traces back to Latin. And of course, the Irish have given us a lot as well, their go leor becoming “galore” in English.

In the aftermath of the Great Famine, or An Gorta Mór, the 19th-century Encyclopedia Britannica — Merriam-Webster’s parent company as of 1964 — published its eighth edition with an extensive entry on Ireland. It explained to readers that Ireland was considered an important colony of the British crown and that the “natives” clung to the Celtic roots of Eri or Erin, Ireland’s name in Irish, “with the attachment of veneration.”

Of course, that veneration was an attempt to preserve a language — and with it, the culture it helped sustain. Even today, though Irish is an official language of both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland, UNESCO classifies it as endangered alongside its Gaelic brethren, Scottish and Manx, the language of the Isle of Man.

The next time Merriam-Webster pokes fun at an Irish name, it might want to first refer to another helpful dictionary: Teanglann, a public project to create a free online library for Irish-language grammar and pronunciation, including audio recordings in each dialect. Not only is the tool indispensable for helping with Irish-language learning, but it also makes it simple to discover words like botún, the Irish for faux pas: “a gross mistake.”

Seán Carlson is working on his first book, a family memoir about Irish migration.

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A Fact

Newborn babies can only see in black and white for a few months.

I got this “fact” from a calendar. It sounds implausible to me but maybe someone will fact check it for us.

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Memories of Christmas Past

By

On January 10, 2024

In History, Listowel, Personal, Poem

Pit stop on Flesk Greenway, Killarney on January 6 2024

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Inchydoney at Christmas

A kind of temporary madness infected my grandchildren at Christmas. People who wear wetsuits on mild summer days went into the freezing sea in swimming togs in December.

Their Dutch visitor, Lotta, joined in the madness.

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A Moving Christmas Farewell

Sean Carlson shared with us his poem in memory of a famous Boston Irishman.

Here is the poem and the introduction from the online literary magazine Trasna

A Celtic Sojourn

For over twenty years famed Boston radio host Brian O’Donovan spread holiday cheer with his annual production of “A Christmas Celtic Sojourn.” From an oversized, red chair, O’Donovan presented to American audiences the Christmas traditions of Ireland through a mix of music, dance, poetry, and storytelling.

Born and raised in Clonakilty, Cork, O’Donovan emigrated to Boston in 1980. Six years later, he joined GBH radio and began producing a weekly radio show featuring traditional Irish music – A Celtic Sojourn. The three-hour show became a Saturday afternoon staple to GBH listeners across New England; and it made O’Donovan a beloved public figure. In 2017, then-Mayor Marty Walsh declared 14 December Brian O’Donovan Day, “in recognition of his contributions to immigrant communities in Greater Boston.” 

O’Donovan died on 6 October after a long battle with brain cancer. This year, as we mourn the voices lost, let us fondly remember a man who brought so much of Irish music and culture to those in his adoptive home of Boston. He was indeed ‘a man you don’t meet every day.’

To our readers and writers, we wish you happy holidays and all the best in the new year. We leave you with this fine poem by Seán Carlson.The Sojourn

in memoriam: Brian O’Donovan, 1957-2023

The seat on stage sits empty

before the reels and ringing

bells, alert to remembrance

brief light of emigrant song

Snow swirls in wind sweeps

salt spread on sidewalk ice

a knit vest, unwound scarf

drape of red curtain lifting

His book opens to Bethlehem

the nativity laid, refuge within

bursting breaths of concertina

tension found in fiddle string

My father played the melodeon

My mother milked the cows—

Touches of Kavanagh haunt

the theatre halls of memory

on the wireless in Boston

West Cork, the world

Window candles flicker there

stables set with summer’s cut

wrenboy clamors at the door

ghosts now around a table

That voice echoes, beside me

my mother, my father

and the drift of one

into another, then

We listen to the eulogy on radio

grace the night already fallen

with a child’s Christmas still

on the tip of our tongues:

I said some words

to the close and holy darkness,

and then I slept.

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The Night of the Big Wind

(Post on Facebook by The Painter Flynn)

It’s that time of year when people look back. Here is another account of the fateful night in 1839 which lived long in the memory of people who lived through it.

Today in 1839  the Night of the Big Wind, “Oíche na Gaoithe Móire”, the most damaging storm in 300 years, sweeps across Ireland, damaging or destroying more than 20% of the houses in Dublin, 4,846 chimneys fell, and waves topped the Cliffs of Moher,  The wind blew all the water
out of the canal at Tuam.
It knocked a pinnacle off Carlow Cathedral and a tower off Carlow Castle.
It stripped the earth alongside the River Boyne, exposing the bones of soldiers killed in the famous battle 150 years earlier.

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Kanturk, My Hometown

Kanturk is in the diocese of Cloyne. Unlike the practice in the Kerry diocese where all the priests of a parish live together, in Cloyne each priest has his own house. The Canon, or parish priest lived in a lovely old house across the road from the church in Kanturk. He had an orchard beside his house and a wood just up the road. The name, The Canon’s Wood has stuck. Nowadays it’s a small amenity with artwork and plants. It has a place to shelter in a downpour as well.

These two “boars” are the work of a local artist. Legend has it that the last wild boar in Ireland was killed outside Kanturk and that is how the town got its name. In Irish Kanturk is Ceann Tuirc.

That box high on a pole is a starling nest box.

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A Fact

Girls have more taste buds than boys do.

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St. Vincent de Paul shop, emigration and people at Vintage Day 2013

By

On May 16, 2013

In Uncategorized

I met these 3 lovely ladies in the St. Vincent de Paul shop on Thursday last. Tina, Helen and Eileen do great work. Take a bow, ladies.

The very next day I was in the shop again and I took this photo of Pat Dea who is their invaluable helper in the watch and clock department. He was returning a clock that he had restored to working order.

Pictured with Pat are volunteers, Eileen O’Sullivan, Mary Sobieralski and Hannah Mulvihill.

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Here we go again

Roadworks on the Tralee to Listowel Road on May 9 2013. It’s all good news though, as this time I was diverted onto a stretch of the new road. The journey to Tralee from Listowel is getting shorter and more enjoyable.

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Bridge Street, Newcastlewest 1900

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Sunday last, May 12 2013 was Mothers’ Day in the U.S. Sean Carlson, whose mother hails from Moyvane, wrote this lovely article in USA Today;

My grandmother gave birth to 16 children over the course
of 24 years.

            Growing up, my grandmother talked
about becoming a teacher.

            Instead, she gave instruction in a
different way: a living example of love and perseverance.


When I was
twelve, my mom and I often shared a cup of tea when I arrived home from school,
just as if she were still living in Ireland. Listening to her recount memories
of her childhood there, I told her that someday I would write her story.
“What story?” she said. “If there is a story to share, it
belongs to my mother, your grandmother, Nell.”

Her
mother, my grandmother, Nell Sheehan, lived her entire life in the rural
southwest of Ireland. In a different time and a different place over the course
of 24 years, from age 23 until 47 she gave birth to 16 children — eight
daughters, eight sons, no twins. My mom was the 15th.

Motherhood
may have been her calling but growing up, my grandmother had done well in
school and talked about becoming a teacher. That option ended with her
marriage, as such jobs were scarce and available either to single women or male
heads of households, but not allowed to be hoarded by two workers in the one
family. Instead, she gave instruction in a different way: a living example of
love and perseverance.

Although
unable to pursue the possibility of a career outside the farmhouse where she
settled, she insisted that her daughters receive an education or other chances
for advancement. The local primary school, a simple building with two
classrooms, stood within walking distance at the top of the lane. The boys
often stopped attending on account of the farm work. Most of the girls,
however, continued their education. Their mother wanted her daughters to have
opportunities in their lives.

By
encouraging them to spend time away, the irony was that she destined her girls
for elsewhere. With bleak economic prospects at the time, little choice
remained for them to stay. One after another, they left home — almost all of
them for the United Kingdom or the United States. Every night, their mother
prayed for their protection.

Despite
the distance, the mother-child relationship stayed strong through the letters
they wrote: accounts of life in new lands, photographs of grandchildren born
abroad. In this way, my mom learned about many of her sisters and brothers. Her
mother held the notepaper close to her chest, near to her heart, savoring the
words as if the sender were present with her there on the page as well. Then,
she read them aloud to her husband and those still at home.

Almost
every envelope included a portion of their earnings as well. How difficult it
is today to imagine enclosing 20% of a weekly salary. Yet, this is what the
children often did for their mother, pleased to think of her being able to buy
fresh tomatoes as a treat or perhaps a haircut in town. After the arrival of
electricity in the area, her oldest son and daughter-in-law bought her even
greater gifts that transformed her life in the home: a washing machine and
later a stove.

My mom
followed in the footsteps of her siblings. Shortly before turning 17, she went
to London with her sister. Whenever she returned home afterwards, traveling by
train, car and ferry, her mom greeted her at the front door of the thatched
farmhouse, so eager for her arrival. Walking her daughter into her room, she sat
on the bed and tapped her hand against the mattress, saying, “tell me all
that has happened since you left.” My mom would then recount the latest
from her sisters and brothers, as well as her experiences away from home.

As her
daughters grew up, my grandmother sometimes confided that she looked forward to
the day when they would return to live nearby, hopefully raising families of
their own near her, able to visit as she aged. Although they didn’t come back
for good, still they remained close. They may have left, but their mother was
with them wherever they went.

A few
years ago, I found a cassette recording from a distant cousin in Florida who
has since passed away. On one of his visits to Ireland decades earlier, he
recorded a conversation with both of my grandparents. As my mom listened to her
mother’s voice for the first time in more than 30 years, the tears came.
Memories flooded back, reminders of the imprint of a mother.

Like every
year, they are there on Mother’s Day. They are there every day.

Sean Carlson
is completing a book about emigration through the lens of his mother’s
experiences, from Ireland to London and the United States.

(This story will be familiar to so many others. I have heard other versions of it recounted in my knitting group by some of those lucky enough to make their way back home, sadly not before the mothers they left behind had passed on.)

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Some people I snapped on Vintage Monday

4 Generations of Barretts

Anthony and Nuala McAulliffe and Jim Halpin

 4 Bombshell Belles

Dan Neville ready for road

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Ballybunion at night courtesy of Ballybunnion Sea Angling

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John Kelliher took the Knockanure communicants  on their big day.

Parents and Friends Garden Fete, the horrors of war and a quiet night in St. John’s

By

On May 3, 2013

In Uncategorized

Finally some photos from last Sunday’s Garden Fete

The children did a great job on the scarecrows. There was a Suarez complete with an impressive set of gnashers and a  Paul Galvin holding a football in one hand and a duster in the other. There was even a real living scarecrow mingling among us.

There were great prizes for the Grand raffle. I got no phonecall so I’m presuming I did not win.

My friend and blog collaborator was browsing among the books.

There was money to be won in a variety of ways at this stall.

T

Some people just came to dance.

(More photos next week)

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NKRO posted this picture to set the scene for our wartime commemoration to take place on Saturday. This is a British position which has been captured by the Germans in 1917. The two German soldiers, probably cold and wet, are wearing British issue great coats and it looks like they took the boots off the feet of the dead soldier in the forefront of the picture.

Isn’t war obscene?

Belgium 1917, the Menin Road, Passendale. The walking wounded straggle back to base past the prone bodies of injured survivors who are waiting to be taken to a field hospital.

Cherrytree in bloom in Cherrytree Drive, Listowel this week.

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This is a great article by Sean Carlson. He is writing about the global reach of an Irish village and the village he knows best is Moyvane;

http://www.irishtimes.com/blogs/generationemigration/2013/04/25/the-reach-of-a-single-village/

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Interesting snippet I learned from The Kerryman.

Well known Listowel natives, Maurice (Monty) and Patricia Reagan are in the news again.

One of their horses, Falling Sky has been selected to compete in The Kentucky Derby tomorrow night. Having a runner in the race is a huge honour  as over 2,000 horses were originally entered to compete.

You can read all about it here :

http://www.kentuckyderby.com

And you can even watch the race live. We will all be cheering if the Newton Anner Stud Farm pair pull off a massive coup.

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One thing that never ceases to amaze me about Listowel
people is this. While we have one of the loveliest little theatres in the world
and we have one of the best literary festivals in Europe, why don’t Listowel people
support theatre in town.

Joe Murphy brings shows to St. Johns that pack theatres
elsewhere, but play to very poor houses in Listowel. It’s nothing short of a
disgrace to us all.

 Are we so parochial
that we will only support theatre if it’s a local play with local actors?

Are There More of You? was the very ironically titled show I
attended on Wednesday evening.  It was a
massively entertaining thought- provoking show, a tour de force by a brilliant playwright and actress, Alison Skilbeck…and she played in Listowel to 4 people.

Let me tell North Kerry people what you missed.

Alison played all the parts and she became a different
person each time she changed costume.

The themes of the play were betrayal and redemption and
there was a lot in it that referenced Macbeth:   an ambitious woman, a kind of witch, some bloody hands and a sleep that “knits up the ravelled sleeve of care.”

Are there More of You? is a play about one  woman who is betrayed by her
husband and redeemed by Art; another Italian -English woman who betrays her Italian
Mama but finds redemption in her Italian roots, cooking and opera; a therapist
betrayed by her client and finally an ambitious ball breaker of a woman who is
redeemed through friendship.

This one woman show is continuing its tour so you can see it
in Dingle tonight Friday May 3 2013;  in Birr on Saturday; in the Millbank in
Rush, Co. Dublin on Sunday and all next week from May 6  to Saturday May 11  2013 in the Viking Theatre over The Sheds pub
in Clontarf.

I strongly recommend you try to catch it.

The lovely Alison joined her audience for a chat after the St. John’s show. That is she with the pink hankie. The audience is Noel Keenan, Helen Moylan, Jim Cogan and me behind the camera. 


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We have a new bishop of Kerry. We will be getting to know Raymond Browne in the near future.

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